Mom pleads guilty after child left in car while she drank

TWO WOMEN WERE FOUND IN BAR NEAR VEHICLE

The trial for a 32-year-old woman who left her young child in a freezing vehicle while she drank in a nearby bar was cancelled Friday after the mother pleaded guilty to a charge of failing to provide the necessaries of life.

The woman, who can't be named under a court-ordered publication ban, was scheduled for trial April 30, but it was cancelled after the accused admitted she left her four-year-old son in her SUV while it was parked, with the engine shut off, outside the bar in -18 C degree weather Dec. 15, 2016.

Crown prosecutor Erin Olsen told court a man called police about 11:25 p.m. after he heard a baby crying in the locked vehicle. When police arrived they had to smash a window to get into the vehicle where they first found a threeyear-old girl.

A four-year-old boy was found a short time later. The girl’s intoxicated 25-year-old mother was found in the bar around the corner from the SUV.

“She told police she forgot about the child,” Olsen said.

The woman was drinking with the little boy’s mother, and by the time police arrived the children had been in the vehicle for nearly an hour, and the women didn’t show any signs of leaving the bar “any time soon.”

The little girl was examined at the hospital and handed over to a family member. The second child wasn’t found until police searched the SUV before it was towed away.

“That child had not been saying anything or crying,” Olsen pointed out. “He was under a pile of jackets, curled up in a ball and shivering in the back seat.”

Although both children were not injured, and had warmed up by the time they were checked by medical personnel, a doctor reported they were clearly displaying the signs of mild or early hypothermia when they were first found. And while the doctor’s report indicated it’s impossible to estimate how much longer it would have taken for severe stages of hypothermia, or worse, to set in, the two children were at risk.

“Possible outcomes could have included local tissue damage from frostbite, cardia arrhythmias (irregular heartbeat), decreased respirations, coma and ultimately death,” the report said.

The mother of the little girl pleaded guilty last October and was sentenced in March. She received a conditional sentence and was placed on probation for one year. Court was told the woman had done everything she could to change her life and help her to be a responsible mother.

On Friday the court ordered a pre-sentence report with a Gladue component for the older woman, which will look at the woman’s personal circumstances and Aboriginal upbringing to help the judge determine a fit sentence. Her sentencing hearing was then adjourned for two months for completion of the reports.

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